Just in time for the public release of Apple's new iOS 7, a series of new iOS 7-savvy apps will hit the iTunes App Store sporting new looks and new technology under the surface.

At its June Worldwide Developer Conference, Apple invited third party developers to adopt the fresh new design it unveiled for iOS 7, while emphasizing that for Apple, design is "more than the way something looks; it's the whole thing, the way something actually works on so many different levels."

Lots of iOS developers have been rethinking the design their apps in the months since, and a variety of new apps will become available tomorrow alongside the release of iOS 7.

In August, Twitterrific developer Craig Hockenberry reported that 95 percent of the 575 developers he surveyed said they were working to add support for iOS 7 features, and 52 percent said they were working on apps that would require the new software.

Threadflip Simplifies

One example is Threadflip, a social app designed to buy, sell and discover fashion finds. It's design team was inspired to "dramatically simplify and emphasize the visual elements" on their mobile shopping platform, dropping the existing versions' heavy menus and rows of buttons for a streamlined presentation espousing iOS 7's edge to edge graphics, borderless buttons and an clean, uncluttered overall presentation.

Threadflip noted that iOS users are its most important demographic, generating three times more engagement within the app compared to web users. App users contribute 80 percent of Threadflip's daily new listings and half of the company's purchases are made via the app.

The company, which has its new iOS 7 app approved for release tomorrow, also noted that efforts to develop for iOS 7 triggered an internal evaluation of how the company could improve its visual experience on other platforms as well, including desktop and mobile web apps.

News360 Illuminates

Newsreader app News360 similarly described iOS 7 as influencing a "rethink" for every screen within the the app, discarding old user interface "baggage" including heavy textures and complex navigation (below).

Following the "complete overhaul," the app now features similar edge to edge visuals that blend into the formerly static status bar, more subtle navigation controls, and a luminous, simplified topic picker (below).

Along with the visual overhaul, the developer also notes that the redesign afforded an opportunity to check a variety of planned features off their internal to-do list. The new edition of the News360 will also be available tomorrow.

Apple teases a series of major app updates

The company presented a brief glimpse (below) of a grid of a couple dozen revamped new iOS 7 apps, ranging from Facebook and Twitter to Evernote and PayPal, during its keynote presentation last week.

Source: iOS 7 apps in Apple video still, via Buzzfeed

Buzzfeed tried to identify as many of the apps as it could from the blurry still, but only managed to name about half of them.

Of those it could make out, it's clear that developers are embracing the focus on full edge to edge visuals, cleaner presentations, and stripping shiny gloss bevels and textured bars of buttons in favor of iOS 7's luminous depth, layered translucency, more elegant lines and simpler icons (below).

They updated everything but now the icons to me look less attractive. You have all this new power in these new chips and phones and you make icons, like Safari look like a 5 year old made them. It's flat and boring IMHO and not very Apple like. Then again, Apple also removed all the color icons in the finder, iPhoto etc.

A mixed bag for me so far. The few apps that have updated on my iOS devices are all pretty sketchy and jumpy, no doubt waiting for iOS 7 itself to behave properly. Many updates seem to be coming into my iTunes app (which I no longer sync with), but aren't yet available over the air for the iDevices.

Also everything related to Apple that's online seems to be dog slow this evening. Even the Apple TV keeps pausing and failing to find content for 30 seconds at a time. Seems kind of sloppy overall.

Also, still annoying how I have automatic downloads and automatic updates turned on and I still have to go to iTunes and manually download all the updates. It's been at least two versions of iTunes since that setting actually worked.

Does anyone know if iOS 7 fixes the wish-list and favourites syncing issue? That one's been going on for over a year.

Some of the simpler icons may look worse when you compare the individual icons side by side, but on the whole it does have a nice feel when you see a screen full of them. It does seem to be influenced by androids style, but at least they took all the cool elements, like being colorful, and the thinner fonts. It still has it's own look and feel, it is still different than any other phone, it still looks like an iPhone to me. Although it's difficult to get used to change, I've already acclimated and find ios 6 old fashioned in many ways when I see someone else's phone. I for one welcome our new OS overlords.

Ooh, here’s a wild thought. Apple did a volume slider button that changes “shine” based on gyroscope, et. al. Apple did a Springboard that shows parallax based on gyroscope, et. al.

How about doing icons that change shine based on gyroscope, et. al.? Right now I’m looking at Pages specifically. Imagine if the glare on the inkwell moved as you moved your device?

IMAGINE IF SAFARI’S NEEDLE POINTED NORTH!

Nothing stupid and flashy. Nothing overt. Nothing that would make your Home Screen look like a teenager’s website in 1995.

Just tasteful. The little things. Like Apple used to do.

I agree that adding moving shine or lighting to the icons, to go along with the background parallax, would have been an awesome effect. As it stands now, the effect is barely visible, unless you're specifically looking for it. Why make a big deal out of something and then not take it all the way? Subtle changing the lighting on the icons as you tilted the phone would have looked gorgeous. But I guess "flat" icons are not supposed to reflect any light at all, or something.

As for these app redesigns.. meh. Not a big fan, and the redesigns are neither inspiring, nor even particularly an improvement to me. I guess I'm not on the whole "the best design is absolutely no design" bandwagon. I'm more into tasteful lushness, and gorgeous detail, down to the pixel, that I guess we're never going to see again from Apple.

I'm working on an app update for iOS 7 and Apple has requested a demo of the app. They're going to provide feedback on the design and possibly promote it as an iOS 7 styled app. They seem to be going all out for this launch.

When a big OS update comes out, it's a good opportunity for previously unknown apps to get noticed, by being the first to adopt new features, and then people download them just to see. I wonder if any new stars will be born today?

I don't know if anyone else has experienced this but as I tried to update my apps, a couple of updates downloaded okay but the installation process seemed to get stuck and would't complete after many minutes. I finally had to force quit iTunes, then I deleted the misbehaving apps (notably Amazon Mobile, Flipboard, and How to Cook Everything) and redownload the app from the iTunes Store, which I assume were already updated. BTW at this point I am still on IOS6.1.3.